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Entry: The Addams Family Chapel Link: http://www.takimag.com/site/article/the_addams_family_chapel#11014 Post contents: I previously discussed how for Protestants the real issue isn’t the Immaculate Conception but “imputed” Grace vs the Catholic “infused” Grace. But imputed Grace isn’t New Testamental. 2. Now to St. Augustine’s mistake. His knowledge of Greek was only a little better than his knowledge of organic chemistry and molecular genetics. He used a very faulty Latin translation of the NT Koine, a translation in circulation in the Western Empire before Jerome’s. He looked at Chapter 5 or Romans, Verse 12. The Greek says “because all men sin”. Augustine had a text that said “in whom all men sin” (perhaps <i>in quo</i> instead of a more correct <i>quod</i> clause?). He looked at “whom” and looked back in the verse to its antecedent, “one man” (Adam). Thus he developed his “inheritance theory” of Original Sin. Had he the correct translation, he never would have developed this theory, for Augustine was a great saint and a faithful man. So inherited sin isn’t New Testamental. The Eastern Church got it and kept it correct: Original Sin isn’t an inherited trait, but simply is a force, a power that enters the world with Adam’s fall, and “infects” us all. This infection is removed, “cured”, by Baptismal Grace. Mary was prevented from being “infected” at all, from the moment of her conception. 3. In explaining this dogma to Protestants, it should be made clear that Mary received the Grace of the Redemption that we all receive in the efficacious sacrament of Baptism. (I should add that this wasn’t the only Grace that she received.) I add also, praying to please Protestants, that this Grace, for Mary as for the rest of us, is gratuitous. Mary, conceptually, needed the Redemption as do the rest of us; in anticipation of the Redemption, Redemptive Grace was given to Mary before the Redemption. Put differently, had there been no redemption, there would have been no Immaculate Conception. So the Solemnity tomorrow ultimately (but not exclusively) is Christological. One problem remains. For my Baptist friends, if I understand them aright, Baptism isn’t efficacious at all, and grace is imputed differently according to the Evangelical Decisionist dogma. For Evangelicals (at least those outside the Church of Christ), if an infant were to be unable to make the decision and then be baptized, then <i>a fortiori</i> an embryo would be unable also. So we have here really not a rejection of the Immaculate Conception, but a rejection of pedobaptism. But Decisionism,“Believer Baptism”, and Imputed Grace aren’t New Testamental. To sum up: all of Protestantism had no choice but to reject the Immaculate Conception because of the Protestant dogmas of total depravity and imputed grace (discussed my previous writeback), for Calvinists in addition and other Anti-Arminians because of the rejections of Cooperating Grace and free(d) will, for Baptists because of the rejection of efficacious Baptism, and for Evangelicals because of the “Decisionist” view. Such dogmas and such rejections are not New Testamental. Well, fair is fair. The Immaculate Conception isn’t New Testamental either. But Catholics never claim to be <i>sola scriptura</i>; Protestants do. Afterthought: I wonder, Was the Reformation polemic, and its Counter-Reformational reply, ultimately over the nature of Grace, OR over the source of authority. Y’all’s view on this most welcome. What th’hell this has to do with a tacky and morbid crypt in a church in Rome is beyond me. Stay upstairs with the refined and the decent to see the fine painting of of Domenichino, Cortona, and the outstanding <i>St. Michael</i> by Reni. Sent at: 2008 09 05